What if DreamWorks Pictures/DreamWorks Animation was founded in 1934?/Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town
Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town is a 1970 American stop motion animated Christmas film produced by Rankin/Bass Productions, distributed by DreamWorks Pictures. The film stars Fred Astaire as the narrator S.D. Kluger, Mickey Rooney as Kris Kringle / Santa Claus, Keenan Wynn as the Winter Warlock, and Paul Frees in various roles. The film tells the story of how Santa Claus and several Claus-related Christmas traditions came to be. It is based on the hit Christmas song "Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town", which was introduced on radio by Eddie Cantor in 1934, and the story of Saint Nicholas. In this film, it explains the origin story about Santa Claus who was started out known as Kris Kringle, and got raised by toy-making elves as an infant. Meanwhile, as years pass, Burgermeister Meisterburger, the cruel-hearted toy-hating mayor of Sombertown, bans all the toys under his new penalty of law. So Kris, along with his penguin friend Topper, must save the town by delivering toys, so he can later become the well-known toy deliver. The film was created using Japanese stop motion animation called "Animagic", in which all the characters are made out of wood and plastic and animated via stop-motion photography. The film was originally released in theaters on December 14, 1970, later aired on ABC in 1971, and continues to air every year on sibling channel ABC Family (now Freeform) though both channels have at times edited the film to make room for commercials (ABC has cut two key songs, as well as two other songs in half; ABC Family/Freeform has cut several scenes that they believe may be traumatizing to young viewers, like Kris climbing, and leaping to escape to prevent children from doing dangerous stunts, Winter Warlock knowing Kris will return, and telling him he will never escape including the scene where the Burgermeister torches the seized toys in front of the children of Sombertown). The DVD releases include these deleted scenes vital to the story's plot. Along with Swan Lake, the film marked DreamWorks Animation’s first time to released two feature films in the same year. Plot Special Delivery "S.D." Kluger (voiced by and resembling Fred Astaire) the mailman is introduced after a newsreel prologue, telling how children around the world are preparing for Christmas and Santa Claus' arrival. When his snowmobile/mail truck breaks down, he tells the story of Santa Claus, answering the children's letters to Santa. The story begins in the gloomy city of Sombertown, ruled by the ill-tempered Burgermeister Meisterburger (voiced by Paul Frees). A baby arrives on his doorstep with a name tag reading "Claus" and note requesting that Burgermeister raise the child. He instead orders his lawkeeper Grimsley (also voiced by Paul Frees) to take the baby to the "Orphan Asylum". On the way there, a gust of wind blows both the sled and the baby to the Mountain of the Whispering Winds, where the animals hide him from the evil Winter Warlock (voiced by Keenan Wynn) and convey him to an Elf family by the name of Kringle in Rainbow River Valley. Led by Tanta Kringle (voiced by Joan Gardner), the elf queen, she and the five Kringle elf brothers (Ringle, Dingle, Zingle, Tingle and Wingle, all voiced by Frees) adopt the baby and name him "Kris". A few years later, Kris hopes to restore the Kringle family as "The First Toymakers to the King". When Kris is old enough, he volunteers to deliver the elves' toys to Sombertown. Unfortunately, Burgermeister has outlawed all toys in the town after he trips on a toy left on the steps, and declares that anyone found possessing a toy will be arrested. On his way to Sombertown, Kris meets a lost penguin whom he names Topper as they evade the Winter Warlock who vows to catch him the next time he passes. In the town, he offers toys to two children washing their stockings with a water fountain. He is stopped by Miss Jessica (voiced by Robie Lester), their lovely schoolteacher, but she softens towards Kris when he offers her a china doll as a "peace offering". As Kris gives more toys, Burgermeister arrives to arrest the children, but Kris gives him a yo-yo. He at first happily plays with it, but Grimsley reminds him he's breaking his own law, leading to Burgermeister ordering Kris' capture. As Kris and Topper return to the Kringles, the Winter Warlock captures them. But when Kris gives him a toy train as a present in exchange, the Warlock befriends Kris as his appearance changes. To repay him, he teaches Kris how to use magic snowballs to see anywhere in the world. Kris tries it out as the snowball shows Jessica is looking for Kris. After being chased and then escapes from the pack of wolves, Kris finally returns to Jessica who informs him that Burgermeister has destroyed all the toys and the children now want new ones. Kris promises to do so if the children behave themselves, promising to watch them through his magic snowball. When Burgermeister hears that Kris means to bring more toys, he orders all doors and windows to be locked before their houses are searched. But Kris enters by the chimneys where the children hung their stockings to dry by the fire where Kris hid the toys. Thereafter, Burgermeister sets a trap for Kris as he makes another delivery, and thus captures the Kringles, Topper, and Winter. Jessica pleads to release her friends, but he refuses. Jessica then asks Winter to break everyone out, but he refuses since he has no magic left except some magic feed corn to make reindeer to fly. With the reindeer's help, the Kringles, Kris, Topper, and Winter escape. After months as an outlaw, Kris returns to the woods, where he grows a beard as a disguise. After Tanta suggests that he return to his birth name "Claus" for safety. But they're unaware that Burgermeister and Grimsley are secretly hides behind one of the trees, overheard the conversation. Burgermeister schemes the better way to get and kill Kris for good this time and whispers to Grimsley about his plan. After Kris marries Jessica, and the group creates a camp for them to spend the night for a long travel to the North Pole where they slumber, Jessica hears a strange noise and walks down to the nearby forest to investigate, when suddenly got captured and taken away by Burgermeister's guards. Kris wakes up as he hears Jessica's cry for help, and rushes to find her until he comes across a note from Burgermeister saying that they've kidnapped Jessica and tells him to come here to his place if he wants to rescue her. So Kris, along with Topper, Winter and one of his reindeer sets off back to Burgermeister place for Jessica's rescue. While Winter is waiting for them outside, Kris and Topper sneaks inside Burgermeister's house, avoiding the guards until they reaches to and frees Jessica. However, Burgermeister and his guards trap Kris and Topper, but they freed from them and the three rushes outside to hop on Kris' reindeer along with Winter to make their escape, but one of Burgermeister's guards shoots Kris' reindeer's hoof causes the all five to fall down. Winter, Topper, and Jessica quickly takes a wounded reindeer back to the camp while Kris fights with Burgermeister, however, Jessica watches Kris' battle with Burgermeister worried about Kris' safety. Burgermeister chases Kris to the thin ice where they continues to fight while being carried by a floating for ride, until they fall over the waterfall, much to Jessica's horror and collapses to tears, thinking of Kris's death. However, Kris hops up back to the cliff, still alive much to Jessica happily hugs him, and Burgermeister's guards retreats in fear all because of their master's defeat. The group travels to the North Pole to build their own castle and workshop. The townspeople then look up to Kris and eventually canonize him as a saint, becoming Santa Claus while Jessica becomes Mrs. Claus. Santa then decides to limit his journeys to one night a year and chooses the right night. Christmas Eve, "the night of profound love." Just as Santa is getting ready to leave, Winter tells him that he has his magic powers back to guarantee the world a white Christmas. At the end, after S.D. Kluger explains Santa's true meaning, he remembers that he still has to deliver the children's letters to him and leaves for the North Pole (joined by Topper, Winter, the Kringle family, and a parade of children singing "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town") during the credits. As they finally reach Santa's workshop, we see Kris and Jessica's shadows inside their castle. Santa steps outside and waves goodbye to the audience as a group of children say, "Merry Christmas!" Cast * Fred Astaire as Special Delivery "S.D." Kluger * Mickey Rooney as Kris Kringle/Santa Claus * Keenan Wynn as Winter Warlock * Robie Lester as Jessica Claus * Paul Frees as Burgermeister Meisterburger, Grimsley, Topper, and other roles * Joan Gardner as Tanta Kringle and other roles Production Before, Dora Wilson had pitched to produce an animated feature about Santa Claus, with the partnership with MGM, in late 1938, while Headin' South was in the production. Along with other films she pitched, she considered to adapt the 1902 L. Frank Baum book The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus into a film. However though, the film had stopped by the box-office disaster of Headin' South due to America joining to the World War II after the attack of Pearl Harbor. TBD In the 1960s, Rankin-Bass made a partnership with Dora Wilson for producing films for her animation house, as they have films pitched, one of them is the film focus on the origin tale of Santa Claus, under the title The Tale of Kris Kringle, but Wilson disliked the name considering she find the working title too generic, before rename the film after the song "Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town", which she found a perfect fitting name for the film. Musical numbers #"The First Toymakers to the King" sung by Tanta and the Kringles featuring the Mike Sammes Singers #"No More Toymakers to the King" sung by Burgermeister Meisterburger and Grimsley #"Be Prepared to Pay" a.k.a. "If You Sit On My Lap Today" sung by Kris and the Westminster Children's Choir #"Put One Foot in Front of the Other" sung by Kris and Winter featuring The Mike Sammes Singers #"My World is Beginning Today" sung by Jessica #"Wedding Song" a.k.a. "What Better Way To Tell You" sung by S. D. Kluger and The Mike Sammes Singers #"Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town" sung by S. D. Kluger and the Westminster Children's Choir Released by Rhino]on October 1, 2002, the soundtrack for Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town is available along with that of Frosty the Snowman, the DreamWorks/Rankin-Bass film produced in 1969. This edition contains the full dialogue and all songs for both films. Release TBD Home media Beginning in 1989, the film has been released numerous times on VHS and DVD. The 2005 DVD release included a CD single of Mariah Carey performing the title song. The special is also available as part of a DVD box set with other Christmas titles including Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Frosty the Snowman, and Frosty Returns. In 2010, the film was released in the same box set on Blu-ray Disc. In 2015, both the film and Frosty the Snowman were released on Blu-ray Disc/DVD combo packs in the 45th Anniversary Collector's Edition. Novelization A novelization (an oversized children's hardback) of the special was published by Running Press Book Publishers in 2008. The script was adapted by Sierra Harimann with watercolor illustrations based on the original show by Mike Koelsch. There are some additional details in the book, although it is unknown if they are from the imagination of the author or were based on the original script. The Dismal Forest is at the foot of the Mountain of the Whispering Winds. The little girl and boy Kris meets when he arrives are named Annette and Andy. The Sombertown Dungeon was built like a fort with a courtyard in the center, and it is there that the reindeer land to rescue everyone. Video game A video game based on the film was released on November 8, 2011 for the Nintendo DS and Wii. Production notes * Sharp-eyed viewers may notice what appears to be writing on the foil covering the back of Grimsley's clipboard during the "No More Toymakers to the King" scene. The writing is in fact the word "LOTTE" repeated over and over. Lotte is a Korean-owned, Japanese-founded confectionery corporation, which can only mean that Grimsley's clipboard was once part of a package of candy. * Rudolph makes a brief cameo following the introduction of the original eight reindeer, but S.D. Kluger tells the audience that he does not play a role here, as his backstory is "another story". * The painting of Santa in his sleigh at the end of the film also appeared in the television special The Year Without a Santa Claus. * In Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July, continuity with this special is established when Santa refers to Mrs. Claus as Jessica and the two reminisce about the china doll he gave her when they first met. * Composer Maury Laws said that this was his favorite television special to work on. Edits * In recent years, the film has often been trimmed for network television time constraints. Jessica's song, "My World Is Beginning Today", is usually cut, and "Be Prepared to Pay" is occasionally dropped as well. The scene where Burgermeister Meisterburger lights the bonfire of toys was also cut at one time, but has since been reinstated. Ownership and broadcast history In 1971, General Electric acquired Rankin-Bass, alongside the film, for GE's Tomorrow Entertainment division, until 1974 where Rankin-Bass was re-purchased as an independent company, but the rights of pre-1974 Rankin-Bass works were still hold by GE before 1988. Despite that, DreamWorks Pictures held the distribution rights to the film until 1988 when Broadway Video purchased the film, and other Rankin-Bass pre-1974 library. In 1996, Golden Books Family Entertainment purchased the film and its home media distribution rights was licensed by Sony Wonder. Early DVD releases of the film also included The Little Drummer Boy TV special as a bonus special. (Later distributors would instead release The Little Drummer Boy separately.) In 2001, the film is owned by Classic Media, which was part of the British-owned Entertainment Rights group until 2012, when DreamWorks re-purchased the film, upon purchasing Classic Media. Following the April 2016 purchase of DreamWorks by NBCUniversal, Comcast now holds those rights as the current owner of the pre-1974 Rankin-Bass library. As of 2019, the film still airs annually on ABC. ABC's sister cable channel, Freeform, also airs this movie as part of their annual 25 Days of Christmas programming block at least once a year. Quotes TBD ---- *'Jessica:' (joyfully hugging Kris after he safely came back up from the cliff) Oh, Kris! I thought you’re a goner. I’d never see you again. But what happened Burgermiaster? *'Kris:' (sadly) Oh. I tried to save his life as I pleased him to change his way, but he didn’t as now his life is taken away. (happy) But on the bright side, at least he’ll never have to bother us by his silly law again. *'Winter:' You said it. ---- TBD Taglines *From the minds of Rudolph and Frosty, comes an all-new animated holiday classic about someone we know that is coming to town. *You better watch out, you better not cry, you better not pout, I'm telling you why... Category:Theories Category:Alternate Reality Category:DreamWorks Animation SKG Category:DreamWorks Animation Category:DreamWorks Category:Dreamworks Films Category:Rankin/Bass Category:Christmas Category:Christmas films Category:Christmas Movies Category:Holidays Category:Santa Claus Category:Stop-motion Category:Stop Motion Films Category:Animated Films Category:Classic Media Category:DreamWorks Classics Category:American Christmas films Category:1970s films Category:1970 Category:1970 films